In the land of the Magna Carta, Tony Blair made the astonishing proposal to permit the police to detain suspects for ninety days without any charges...and now he's had to back down:
Senior Downing Street sources said that although the Prime Minister remains personally convinced that allowing police to detain suspects for up to 90 days without trial is essential to combating the threat from al-Qaeda, he has now accepted that in the present political climate he will have to compromise.
Without a change, Blair faced the prospect of his first defeat in the House of Commons this week, with MPs warning that he would have to quit if he lost and the Tories threatening to shoot down the entire anti-terror legislation. He was also facing protests within his own cabinet.
In an unusual step, No 10 has withdrawn from negotiations on the controversial 90-day rule and left the Home Secretary, Charles Clarke - who is understood to have protested that rejecting a deal would put him in an impossible position - to find a compromise.
Blair hopes that the move will reassure the angry Labour MPs who were likely to scupper the bill, which will be put to the vote on Wednesday....
The Home Office will also offer concessions this week over separate plans to criminalise religious hatred - bowing to demands from peers for safeguards to protect freedom of speech - and over proposals in the terror bill to outlaw the glorification of terrorism, introducing new safeguards making clear what would trigger a prosecution.
The retreat reflects the strength of feeling not only in the Commons, but within the legal establishment. Lord Woolf, who retired as Lord Chief Justice only a month ago, becomes the most senior judicial figure yet to criticise the measures today, warning of the gradual erosion of 'what is acceptable' in the effort to combat terrorism.
He spoke after chairing a London lecture at which Israel's chief justice, Aharon Barak, said judges must 'protect democracy both from terrorism and from the means the state wants to use to fight terrorism'.
Woolf agreed, adding in an unprecedented intervention: 'Every time you move the goalposts, you are accepting a different level of what is acceptable. That then becomes the new starting point, whereas before it was the last point. And that is the case with the length of time one can hold people in custody without charge.'
Friends of Lord Goldsmith, the Attorney-General, have also disclosed that he is not convinced of the 90-days case because he 'has not seen evidence that robustly supports this' - contradicting Blair....
UPDATE: Alas, I spoke too soon.
A FINAL ONE: Three cheers for democracy!
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